Responsibility means accountability, liability
to blame and punishment. We do not hold accountable those classes
whom it would do no good to blame or punish. Babies, the feeble
minded, the insane, are not deterred by blame; hence we do not hold
them responsible. Beyond these obvious exemptions there are all sorts
of degrees of responsibility, carefully worked out in that branch of the
law known as "torts." The principle upon which man has instinctively
gone, and which the law now recognizes, in holding men accountable
or, in other words, imputing responsibility-is the degree in which they
might have been expected to foresee the consequences of their acts.
The following set of cases will illustrate the principle:
(1) We do not hold a man responsible at all for unforeseeable results
of his action. If because of turning his cows into pasture a passing
dog gets excited and tramples a neighbor's flower-bed, the owner of
the cows is not responsible for the damage; it would do no good to
exact punishment for what was so indirectly and unexpectedly due to
his action.
(2) But if his cows got over the wall and trampled the beds, he would
be held responsible, in different degrees, according to the
circumstances. If he had inspected the wall with eyes of experience
and honestly thought it would keep the cows in, we deem him only slightly
responsible. He could have done nothing more; yet he must learn more
accurately to distinguish safe walls from unsafe.
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